TERRE HAUTE, Ind. - The government has set an April 16 federal execution for an Arkansas man convicted in the 1994 kidnapping and death of a 16-year-old girl who was raped, beaten and buried alive after her abduction was recorded in a desperate 911 call.

Bruce Carneil Webster, 33, of Pine Bluff, Ark., is scheduled to die by injection at the U.S. Penitentiary in Terre Haute at 7 a.m. that day, the Bureau of Prisons said in a news release.

Webster and another man on the federal death row here, Orlando C. Hall of El Dorado, Ark., were among five men whom prosecutors said kidnapped Lisa Rene from her Arlington, Texas, home to get revenge on her two brothers for a botched $5,000 marijuana deal. Over two days, she was taken to Arkansas, gang-raped, bludgeoned with a shovel and buried alive.

Rene, a native of the Virgin Islands who was living with relatives at the time of the abduction, was dragged from the family's apartment as she pleaded with a 911 operator. "They're trying to break down my door! Hurry up!" she said, according to a tape of the call.

A muffled scream is heard seconds later, with a man saying, "Who you on the phone with?" before the line goes dead.

Rene's body was found in a shallow grave at a nature reserve in Pine Bluff on Oct. 2, 1994.

Webster was sentenced to death by U.S. District Court Judge Terry R. Means of the Northern District of Texas on Sept. 24, 1996, on a jury's recommendation.

Webster would become the first prisoner put to death by the federal government since the March 18, 2003, execution of Louis Jones Jr., a Gulf War veteran who had raped and killed a female soldier, and the fourth since it resumed executions in 2001 after a 38-year suspension. The others were Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh and drug kingpin Juan Garza.

No execution date has been set for Hall, prison spokesman Samuel Batts said.

I think that the drugs might have played a role if there was a federal drug investigation into these guys' activities. The other reason for the federal jurisdiction is probably because the girl was abducted in Texas and taken across the state line to Arkansas where she was murdered and buried.

I hope that this girl's family can find a modicum of peace when these dirtbags are put down...

It's too bad this poor girl wasn't armed. With a little luck justice wouldn't have had to wait 12 years and she would have saved herself. Somebody breaking down your door seems like a perfect time to let loose with the lead instead of wasting time on the phone to police who most likely won't arrive in time.

The facts are the same as in the case of Webster's co-conspirator, Orlando Hall. See United States v. Hall, 152 F.3d 381 (5th Cir. 1998). Webster, Hall, and Marvin Holloway ran a

marihuana trafficking enterprise in Pine Bluff, Arkansas. They purchased marihuana in varying amounts in the Dallas/Fort Worth area with the assistance of Steven Beckley, who lived in Irving, Texas. The marihuana was transported, typically by Beckley, to Arkansas and stored in Holloway's house. On September 21, 1994, Holloway drove Hall from Pine Bluff to the airport in Little Rock, and Hall took a flight to Dallas to engage in a drug transaction. Beckley and Hall's brother, Demetrius Hall (D. Hall), picked up Hall at the airport. Later that day, Hall and Beckley met two local drug dealers, Stanfield Vitalis and Neil Rene (N. Rene), at a car wash and gave them $4700 for the purchase of marihuana. Later that day, Beckley and D. Hall returned to the car wash to pick up the marihuana, but Vitalis and N. Rene never appeared. When Hall got in touch with Vitalis and N. Rene by telephone, they claimed they had been robbed of the $4700. Using the telephone number that Beckley had dialed to contact Vitalis and N. Rene, Hall procured an address at the Polo Run Apartments in Arlington, Texas, from a friend who worked for the telephone company. Hall, D. Hall, and Beckley began conducting surveillance at the address and saw Vitalis and N. Rene exit an apartment and approach the same car they had driven to the car wash, which they claimed was stolen from them along with the $4700. Hall therefore deduced that Vitalis and N. Rene had lied to him about having been robbed. 2

On September 24, Hall contacted Holloway and had him drive Webster to the Little Rock airport. From there, Webster flew to Dallas. That evening, Hall, D. Hall, Beckley, and Webster returned to the Polo Run Apartments in a Cadillac owned by Cassandra Ross, Hall's sister. Hall and Webster were armed with handguns, D. Hall carried a small souvenir baseball bat, and Beckley had duct tape and a jug of gasoline. They approached the apartment from which they had previously seen Vitalis and N. Rene leave. Webster and D. Hall went to the front door and knocked. The occupant, Lisa Rene, N. Rene's sixteen-year-old sister, refused to let them in and called her sister and the police emergency phone number. After Webster unsuccessfully attempted to kick in the door, he and D. Hall looked through a sliding glass door on the patio and saw that Lisa Rene was on the telephone. D. Hall shattered the door with the bat; Webster entered the apartment, tackled Lisa Rene, and dragged her to the car. Hall and Beckley had returned to the car when they heard the sound of breaking glass. Webster forced Lisa Rene onto the floorboard of the car, and the group drove to Ross's apartment in Irving. Once there, they exited the Cadillac and forced Lisa Rene into the back seat of Beckley's car; Hall climbed into the back seat as well. With Beckley at the wheel and Webster in the front passenger seat, they drove around looking for a secluded spot. During the drive, Hall raped Lisa Rene and forced her to perform fellatio on him. 3

Unable to find a spot to their liking, they eventually returned to Ross's apartment. From there, Beckley, D. Hall, and Webster drove Lisa Rene to Pine Bluff. Hall remained in Irving and flew back to Arkansas the next day. En route to Pine Bluff, Webster and D. Hall took turns raping Lisa Rene. Once Beckley, D. Hall and Webster reached Pine Bluff, they obtained money from Holloway to get a motel room. In the room, they tied Lisa Rene to a chair and raped her repeatedly. Hall and Holloway arrived at the motel room on the morning of September 25. They went into the bathroom with Lisa Rene for approximately fifteen to twenty minutes. When Hall and Holloway came out of the bathroom, Hall told Beckley, "She know too much." Hall, Holloway, and Webster then left the motel. Later that afternoon, Webster and Hall went to Byrd Lake Park and dug a grave. That same evening, Webster, Hall, and Beckley took Lisa Rene to the park but could not find the grave site in the dark, so they returned to the motel room. In the early morning of September 26, Beckley and D. Hall moved Lisa Rene to another motel because they believed the security guard at the first motel was growing suspicious. The same morning, Webster, Hall, and Beckley again drove Lisa Rene to Byrd Lake Park. They covered her eyes with a mask. Hall and Webster led the way to the grave site, with Beckley guiding Lisa Rene by the shoulders. At the grave site, Hall turned Lisa Rene's back toward the grave, placed a sheet over her head, and hit 4

her in the head with a shovel. Lisa Rene screamed and started running. Beckley grabbed her, and they both fell down. Beckley hit her in the head twice with the shovel and handed it to Hall. Webster and Hall began taking turns hitting her with the shovel. Webster then gagged her and dragged her into the grave. He stripped her, covered her with gasoline, and shoveled dirt back into the grave. When buried, Lisa Rene, although unconscious, likely was still breathing. Hall, Beckley, and Webster then returned to the motel and picked up D. Hall. Based on information from the victim's brothers, D. Hall was arrested; Hall and Beckley subsequently surrendered to the police. On September 29, just after turning himself in, Beckley gave a confession to a police detective and an FBI agent in which he admitted to the kidnaping of Lisa Rene and implicated himself, Hall, and an individual known as "B-Love." Beckley stated that he had last seen Lisa Rene at the Pine Bluff Motel with B-Love. A security guard at the motel informed the agents and officers that Webster went by the name B-Love, and provided a description of Webster and his vehicle. When Webster pulled into the motel parking lot during the early morning of September 30, he was detained and subsequently arrested.

Disclaimer:
Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual
posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its
management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the
exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.